China traditional beauty standard

what is a beauty? What is the standard of beauty?

Beauty generally refers to a woman with beautiful appearance. Zhang Chao, a Qing Dynasty man, summed it up more comprehensively in A Dream Shadow: "The so-called beauties take flowers as their appearance, birds as their voices, the moon as their gods, Vitamin as their state, jade as their bones, ice and snow as their skin, autumn water as their posture, poetry as their heart, and calligraphy as their fragrance, so I can't stop.".

With regard to the standards of beauty, people living in different times, regions and cultural environments may have differences in "aesthetics", but on the whole, they still have some distinct similarities.

Based on China's immortal masterpieces praising beautiful women in past dynasties, as well as various versions of ancient and modern authors' comments on beautiful women, the study of beautiful women summarizes ten criteria for evaluating ancient beautiful women in China:

1. If the skin is coagulated, the coagulated fat is smooth, delicate and white. "If the skin coagulates fat", the skin is smooth, delicate and white, which is one of the main standards of ancient beauty in China.

the beauty of a woman's body depends first on her skin, and white skin is the most rare. The Book of Songs says, "I used to think it was gorgeous", and the vegetarian is white. "Women's nature, but white is the most difficult. There are often people who show their eyes like a tongue, but the defects are only in the skin "(Qing Li Yu's" Casual Love, sound volume Department "). In ancient times, there was a saying that "one white covers all the ugliness", and whether the skin is white and tender is often regarded as the first criterion of female beauty.

"Skin congeals fat" comes from The Book of Songs Wei Feng Shuo Ren, which describes the beauty of Zhuang Jiang, the wife of Wei Zhuanggong, in the Spring and Autumn Period. It can be said that the Han nationality, born as a yellow race, has regarded white skin as beauty since the pre-Qin period. For example, Zuo Si's "Poems of Charming Girls": "There are charming girls in my family, and they are quite white"; Zhou Bangyan's "Nan Ke Zi": "The neck is thick and crisp, and the light shirt is pale pink".

As the ultimate white "snow" and crystal clear "ice", it is often used to decorate the skin of beautiful women. The phrase "ice and snow" comes from Zhuangzi's "Happy Travel": "If the skin is ice and snow, it is graceful as a virgin", which has been borrowed by many later generations, such as Song Yu's "The Lothario": "The eyebrows are like emerald feathers, and the muscles are like snow"; Wen Tingyun's "Bodhisattva Man": "The clouds on the temples want to smell the snow on the cheeks"; The Five Dynasties Xue Zhaoyun's "Huanxisha": "Leaning against the wind to coagulate the snow skin"; Wu Wenying's "A Gift from He Xinlang Lake": "Snowy jade skin on a warm spring night"; Qing Su Manshu's Poems of Skill: "Wushe Ling Bo's muscles are like snow" and so on. A popular term in ancient poetry is "jade bone Ice Muscle", and Meng Chang, the owner of Shu, praised Mrs. Hua Rui in "Jade Louchun Summer on the Maha Pool": "The ice muscle jade bone is clear without sweat, and the wind in the water temple is dark and fragrant and warm"; Su Shi paraphrased this word in "Song of the Cave Immortal": "jade bone with ice muscles is cool and sweat-free"; Su Shi borrowed this expression in another poem "Xijiang Moon Plum Blossom": "Why is jade bone so worried about fog? Ice muscle has its own fairy wind ",the surface is Yongmei flower, which actually implies that his concubine is facing the clouds;" Yang Wu-chiu's Liu Zaoqing also has "jade bone Ice Muscle, who is your preference".

In poems describing women's bodies, the word "jade" appears more frequently than the words "ice" and "snow". China people prefer jade, because "jade is moist but not dirty, but benevolent and clean" (Chunqiu Fanlu Zhiluo). Smooth and moist "jade" is also often used to describe the skin of beautiful women. For example, Jiang Yan's "Li Se Fu": "Fairy algae is beautiful, ice and jade are beautiful"; Liu Yong's "Day and Night Music": "I am tired of jade round rubbing my neck"; Liu Yong's Acacia Belt: "A skin as muddy as jade" and so on. According to "Notes on the Year of the Prince", Liu Bei's wife, Queen Gan, has a soft and graceful posture. Once Liu Bei called Gan to his account. From afar, the subordinates saw that the Queen Gan in the account was like gathering snow under the moon. Henan presented a jade man, three feet tall. Liu Bei put the Jade Man behind the Ganmei Man. Gan Hou and Jade Man are white and moist. Liu Bei said, "I don't think I have two jade people."

in the above poems, the words "fat", "bright", "crisp", "ice", "snow", "jade" and "vegetarian" are used to describe the white, smooth and smooth body.

2. Bright eyes and good eyes

Bright, clean, smart and full of charm are also one of the main standards of ancient beauty in China.

the beauty of a woman focuses on her eyes. "Face is the master of the whole body" (Li Yu's "Casual Letter to sound volume Department"), and the eye is the master of one side. The eyes are the windows of the soul. "It's wonderful to see the evil and the right in the heart." Li Yu believes that the size and movement of a woman's eyes are closely related to her tenderness and ignorance. "Small-minded and elderly, the nature must be soft"; "Those who are active and clear in black and white will be more intelligent".

"Bright eyes and good eyes" comes from Cao Zhi's Ode to Luo Shen, which describes Luo Shen's bright and flexible eyes and is good at looking around and expressing feelings. Beautiful eyes look forward to life, but also increase the charm of beautiful women. The description of beauty eyes by ancient China literati was more imaginary than real, paying special attention to the charm of eyes, or the charm of eyes. For example, "The Book of Songs Wei Feng Shuo Ren": "Clever smile, beautiful eyes"; Li Yannian's "Beauty in the North": "Take care of the city and then the country"; Cao Zhi's "Beautiful Woman": "Looking forward to the glory, whistling and screaming"; Tao Yuanming's "Leisure Fu": "Instantly beautiful eyes are flowing, talking and laughing without distinction"; Bai Juyi's Song of Eternal Sorrow: "if she but turned her head and smiled, there were cast a hundred spells, and the powder and paint of the Six Palaces faded into nothing"; Cao Xueqin's Dream of Red Mansions: "A pair of eyes that seem to be happy but not happy" are also famous sentences that describe the charm of beautiful eyes.

the water in autumn is clear and bright. In China's ancient poems, lyrics and songs, expressions such as "autumn water" and "eyes" are often used to describe the clear and bright eyes of beautiful women. For example, the Book of Songs Zheng Feng Wild Creep: "There is a beautiful person, Wan Ru is young", and "young" means watery, and the clear water is used to compare the smart and bright eyes; Yan Jidao's "Picking Mulberry Seeds": "An inch of eyes, a thousand pearls are not enough", and "a thousand pearls" is used as a metaphor for bright, clean, flexible and tender eyes; Tang Er Ge by Li He in Tang Dynasty: "A pair of eyes with autumn water", which is a metaphor for a clear and clean eye pool; Cui Huige by Yuan Zhen in Tang Dynasty: "Eyes are as bright as a glass bottle, and the heart swings with clear autumn water", and "glass bottle" and "clear autumn water" are used as metaphors for clear and agile eyes; Liu E wrote in Travel Notes of Lao Can: "Those eyes are like autumn water, like a cold star, like an orb, like two pills of black mercury in white water and silver ...", using "autumn water, cold star and orb" as a metaphor for Ming Che's eyes with gods, and using "two pills of black mercury in white water and silver" as a metaphor for the black and bright pupil; In A Dream of Red Mansions, Cao Xueqin often writes about women's eyebrows, such as "eyebrows puckering in the spring mountains, eyes puckering with autumn waters" and so on.

3. Cloudy hair

Black, bright, thick and slender are the aesthetic standards of ancient beauty's hair in China.

"Clouds are full of beauty" comes from Sima Xiangru's Fu on Beauty. "Cloud hair" describes hair as dark and thick as dark clouds; "Feng Yan" means that the hair is not only thick, but also bright and shiny.

China's traditional aesthetic view is beautiful with thick black hair. In ancient poems, the word "cloud" is often used to describe the blackness and profundity of hairdressing, such as The Book of Songs: "Curly hair is like a cloud, disdainful". "sideburns" means thick and black hair, and "parallel" means a bun. This ancient poem praises the thick and dark hair as a dark cloud in the sky. With such black hair, you don't bother to use fake bun. Another example is He Ning's Linjiang Fairy: "Snow muscles and clouds will melt", and Wen Tingyun's Bodhisattva Man: "The clouds on the temples want to make the cheeks snow", which contrasts the snow-white skin with the black hair and sets off the beauty of the hair. In ancient times, women's hair styles were mainly bun, and only thick hair could comb out a variety of bun styles. Because all women can't have thick hair naturally, wigs flourish. The prosperity of wigs shows the ancient people's love and pursuit of thick hair from one side.

China's traditional aesthetic is beautiful with bright black hair. The ancients often used the word "Jian" to describe the pitch-black shine of hairdressing. For example, "Zuo Zhuan Zhao Gong Twenty-eight Years": "In the past, there was still a daughter who was black and beautiful, and the light could be used as a mirror, and she was named Xuan wife." Zuo Qiu praised the daughter born to Ren's family as "black and beautiful" and compared her black and shiny hair to a bronze mirror. Another example is "Seven Discrimination of Zhaoming's Selected Works": "Curled hair is mysterious, and light can be used as a mirror"; Cai Yong's "Qing Yi Fu": "Xuanguang Runrun". "Curl" and "Xuan" are both words praising blackening.

China's traditional aesthetic view is that long hair is beautiful. The ancients in our country had a special liking for women's long hair. For example, The Book of the New Tang Dynasty and Biography of Empresses recorded that Tang Gaozu's wife, Queen Dou, was born with her hair hanging over her neck, and she began to wear it at the age of three, and when she grew up, she had a dark and beautiful cloud. Yu Tong's "Jealousy" in the Southern Dynasties records that in Jin Mingdi, the daughter of Li Shi, the master of Shu, was taken as a concubine by Fu Huan Wen, Huan Wen's wife, and Kang princess royal, who was jealous, could not bear to kill Li because she saw her long hair. Another example is "Gao Zuji in the Book of Chen", which says: "Zhang Guifei's hair is seven feet long, and his curls are like paint, so his light can be discerned". Seven feet is only an approximate figure, describing a woman's hair as very long and beautiful.

It's a kind of beauty to have the hair floating in the clouds. More often, it's a bun or a bun, which is made by tying the hair into a knot and hanging it on the top of the head, behind the head or at both sides. In ancient times, there were many styles of women's hair, and they competed for each other. There were nearly 3 kinds of hair in the palace in the past dynasties listed in the book "Hairpin" written by Tang Duan Kegu, and nearly 4 kinds were added in the book "Continued Hairpin" written by Qing Bao Xie. Ten kinds of ballads in Ten Buns written by Xu Shijun are probably popular, namely: phoenix bun, nearly fragrant bun, flying fairy bun, concentric bun, fallen horse bun, snake bun, hibiscus bun, sitting sad bun, anti-wan leyou bun and noisy sweeping makeup bun.

4, moth eyebrow indigo naturalis

Slender, curved and light blue are the aesthetic standards of ancient beauty eyebrows in China.

The ancients called eyebrows "the rainbow of seven emotions" because it showed different modality and made the face more stereoscopic. In fact, the description of women's bodies in ancient poems is probably the most about eyebrows. Among them, two points are mainly emphasized: slender and curved. For example, Sima Xiangru's Zi Xufu: "Long eyebrows and Lian Juan"; Cao Zhi's Luo Shenfu: "Xiu Mei Lian Juan"; Bai Juyi's "The White-haired Man in Shangyang": "Qingdai has a slender eyebrow"; Lu Guimeng's Mo Shang Sang: "Long eyebrows are like fireworks stickers"; Wen Tingyun's "South Songs": "The temples hang low and comb the bun, and Lian Juan sweeps the eyebrows carefully", "The bun is messy and the eyebrows are long, so I want to gather the eyebrows and return them to the embroidery households".

The slender and curved eyebrows can be summed up in one word, namely "moth eyebrows". The tentacles of silkworm moths are slender and curved, so they are called. Such as "The Book of Songs Wei Feng Shuo Ren": "A cicada's head and a moth eyebrow"; Song Yu's "Goddess Fu": "Mei Lian Juan is a moth"; Fu Xuan's "There are Women's Poems and Songs": "The moths and eyebrows are divided into emerald feathers"; He Yu's "Memorizing the Ancient Meaning": "Clear the mirror to the moth eyebrow"; Zhang Hu's "Gathering the Lingtai": "Sweep the moth's eyebrows to the supreme"; Bai Juyi's "Silver Bottle at the Bottom of the Well": "Wan Zhuan double moths are far away from the mountains"; Gu Huan's "Spring in the Jade House": "Two moths on the pillow gather fine green" and so on, all of which praise the moth eyebrows.

There are words like "moth" and "moon" and "willow" to describe the slender and curved eyebrows. For example, Liang Jiangyan in the Southern Dynasties wrote "Goddess on the Water": "Red lips write Zhu, and true eyebrows learn the moon"; Du Mu's "Boudoir Love": "Juanjuan has a moon eyebrow"; Yan Shu's "Huanxisha": "The cicada wants to meet the eyebrows and the moon"; Yan Jidao's "Bodhisattva Man": "Worrying about spring and painting the curved moon in detail" and so on, are all about moon eyebrows. Bai Juyi's everlasting regret: "but a petal was like her face and a willow-leaf her eyebrow"; Li Shangyin's "Harmony with People on the Tomb of the True Mother": "Liu Mei talks in vain"; Tang Zhao Luanluan's Liu Mei: "Twisting willow leaves and worrying about the border"; Wei Zhuang's "The Female Crown": "Still peach-faced, low-frequency arch eyebrows"; Tang Wang Yan's "Ganzhou Qu": "Liu Mei's peach face can't win spring" and so on, all of which are written by Liu Mei.

The beauty of eyebrows lies not only in its shape, but also in its color. For example, Song Yu's "The Lothario": "The eyebrows are like jade feathers", and the shape and color of the eyebrows are written. Eyebrows are dark and light in color, but beautiful women focus on light and green. The eyebrows of beautiful women are often referred to as "distant mountains" and "spring mountains" in ancient poems. There is no doubt that the distant mountains are very light. The mountains in spring are not as rich as those in summer, so these colors are all light blue. For example, "Miscellanies of Xijing": "Wen Jun is beautiful, and her eyebrows are like Yuanyuan Mountain." In the Western Han Dynasty, Zhuo Wenjun's eyebrows, such as distant mountains, became fashionable for a while, and were called "distant mountain eyebrows". Bai Juyi's "One Hundred Rhymes of Sleepwalking in Spring Poetry": "The eyebrows converge on the distant mountains"; Liu Yong's Jade Butterfly: "Green eyebrows open, charming and far away"; Wei Zhuang's Lotus Cup: "A pair of distant eyebrows"; Gu Huan's Distant Complaints: "Two eyebrows are far away from the mountain"; Yan Jidao's "Bodhisattva Man": "The eyebrows in the spring mountain are low" and so on, all of which are written in the distant mountains. Diane, it's a blue-black pigment. Ancient women often used black eyebrows, so they called them black eyebrows or black eyebrows.

Thrush is the most popular and common makeup method in China. For example, Qu Yuan's "Chu Ci Da Zhao": "White and black, Shi Fangze only". "Black" refers to thrusting eyebrows with cyan and black pigments. Li Shangyin's poem "Untitled": "When I was eight years old, I stole a mirror, but I was able to draw long eyebrows." Even young girls learned to draw long eyebrows, indicating the popularity of thrush in the Tang Dynasty. Wei Zhuang's "Visiting Wushan Temple": "Spring comes empty and fighting thrush grows long", which reflects that ladies-in-waiting kill time by competing with others to draw long eyebrows; Yan Jidao's "Huanxisha": "Every day, the eyebrows fight to draw a long picture", describing the courtesan's daily struggle to draw a long eyebrow and compete for beauty. Tang Zhuqing's "A recent trial to Zhang Shui Department": "Don't make up your eyebrows and ask your husband, is it fashionable to thrush?" After the makeup is finished, the woman thinks to herself, should she ask her husband: Is the eyebrow shape and depth of the painting fashionable?

5. Apricot face and peach cheeks

It is the aesthetic standard of ancient beauty faces in China that it shines brightly and shines red in white.

In ancient poems, lyrics, songs and fu, the beauty face was described, and its brilliance was emphasized. For example, Song Yu's "Goddess Fu": "The appearance is rich and graceful, and the jade face is moist"; Sima Xiangru's "Beauty Fu": "Yan Sheng is full of color, Jing Yao is bright"; Zhang Heng's "Ding Qing Fu": "The husband and the witch are beautiful, gorgeous and beautiful"; Cao Zhi's Ode to the Goddess of Luo: "Turn to the essence, smooth and beautiful"; Cao Zhi's "Poem on Meditation": "The beauty is bright and streamer, outstanding and unparalleled"; Jin Luji's Journey to the Southeast Corner of Sunrise: "The beauty is bright and bright, and the heart is clear and carefree", all of which highlight the beauty and luster.

The ancients often used "jade" to describe the appearance of beautiful women, such as "jade face" or "Yan Ruyu", in order to express the warmth, smoothness and beauty of jade. In addition to the above-mentioned famous sentences, there is also the twelfth of Nineteen Ancient Poems: "Yanzhao has a beautiful woman, and the beauty is Yan Ruyu"; A song of a girl from loyang by Wang Wei: who notices the girl from Yue with a face of white jade, humble, poor, alone, by the river, washing silk?, etc.

The description of beautiful women's faces in ancient poems, lyrics and songs is not pure white, but too pale, without a trace of blood, which will give people a morbid feeling. What is in harmony with white is pink, and what the authors appreciate is that it is white and red. For example, Song Yu described the girl next door in "The Lothario Fu": "The powder is too white, and the Zhu is too red", which puts forward the standard of harmonious beauty, which is also a healthy beauty. The perfect combination of white and red is also described in The Biography of Empress Han Xiaohui: "Without makeup, the color is like the morning glow reflecting snow". The red morning glow is reflected on the snow, which is just artistic conception, which is fascinating enough.

The ancients often used flowers to compare the appearance of beautiful women, such as peaches, apricots, hibiscus (lotus) and so on, emphasizing the delicate and charming face like flowers. This "color" is, of course, "white inside and red inside". Commonly used words are "apricot face and peach cheeks", "peach cheeks and pink face", "peach blossom with human face" and "face like lotus". In the Book of Songs Zhao Nan Tao Yao, there has long been a saying that "the peach flies away, burning its splendor", and the blooming peach blossoms are used to compare the rich appearance of the woman to be married. "Apricot face and peach cheeks", with a face like apricot white and cheeks like peach red, comes from the first fold of the fourth book of Yuan Wang Shifu's The West Chamber: "Apricot face and peach cheeks, riding in the moonlight, are more delicate.